All morning, the Work,
interrupted by a talk with an old friend
about the weird weather.

More Work, then more talk with another friend
about him fearing the future.
I have a lot of that to say, too.

To the store for dinner.
An old man counting out his wallet
while the cashier waits.

Late-day coffee.
The woman in front of me
clutches keno tickets.

Homeward bound
with a few bags of food
and new music in the car stereo.

Warmer now
than I was at midday.
Broke, wired, but feeling lucky.

Good things ahead, I hope.
I get the oven ready and begin,
still humming.

I can’t wait to feed another.
I can’t wait to be fed.
I cannot wait to forget the diary

and leave the entry
till tomorrow, when I may choose
to say nothing about today at all. 

you let yourself fall on rocks
even if yet-unknown hands
are not there
to catch you 

and when they do not

you honestly rise
and honestly fall again,
honestly expecting
to be caught 

and when you are not

you get up again
and do not lie about your fear
but fall again
this time expecting
to be caught

and when you are not
you do it again
and when you are not
you do it again
and when you are not

you get up again
and fall

eventually you break the rocks

distraught parents
don’t know what to do

their children
have fallen in love
with dust storms

they reach for a bible story
god
is coming soon
come in out of the grit

the kids are otherwise enthralled
they aren’t waiting for that late god

instead they start a faith
borne up by watching the wind
bore holes in rock

for their parents’ faith
has bred in them the need
for something to judge

go tell it:

warn this buff fuck
on the corner
something’s coming,
gonna brush him back,
brush him up,
don’t matter how big he is,
he’s gone if he don’t
move;

tell that python-thighed lady
she has no good hold
on her step, no matter how
she clings she’s gonna be
taken;

gather every still-happy kid
and get them inside, away from
the windows, back in the back
away from the war side of the house
and put them on the floor
down low, low as they can
go.

and now, as for you:

right now, just stand
in the shadows for the moment,
just the way we always hung back
among the trees, watching for steel
and fire, listening for dog-hungry
men to come up the street pounding
doors, smashing walls, licking the ground
to get a taste of what they
seek.  

only a fool
can’t see what’s coming.
you’re no fool.

get a grip on something hard, and stand
until the moment comes
to swing it.

go tell it:
it’s coming.
again.

A memory of fire,
stone axe,
and tears
wants your arm
to extend itself
in a sweeping blow
from time to time.

Something
about the sight of tears
hinting red in the firelight
on another’s face
still makes some part of you
sing, and you could swear
there’s a flake of stone
in your shoe that cuts you
at every step.

Pain, war, grief, anger:
with all this killer memory
loose in you,
tearing you,
wounding you,
I wonder if you’ll still be alive
when it finally comes time
for you to die. 

They strut their fur
on our streets,
tails rolling and breaking
in proud waves as if they believe

our homes, sidewalks, cables and poles
were built for them.  
That said, they scatter
when we come out;

apparitions of alien intent
walking among them, beings so unfamiliar 
that no accommodation
can ever be made for us.

Deep down,
we know
they’re in the right.

“What was the name of that poem
about the raven?”
she asks.

“It’s called 
‘The Raven,’ ”
I say.

“No, not that one.
The one about the raven
picking at a body.”

“I don’t know that one, Mom,”
I shrug.  “I don’t know the name
of every poem ever written
about a raven.”

She’s convinced me
to come back here
where I haven’t been for years —

back among the marred wood
on every piece of furniture
in the family room,

a dent
in the unpainted drywall,
perfectly placed at the level 
of a ten year old’s 
head.

She runs her hand
over the depression.

“You knew the name once,”
she says, as her hand flutters away from the wall.
“It was a good poem.  You knew a lot
of good poems, and all their names.”

“I know.  I used to have a memory for things,
Ma.  
I used to have a mind like a trap. Now..” 

Lion-flavored flatgrass
for a last mattress:
I don’t care.

I have named half the vultures
I can see above me:
it’s all I’ve got to do.

I don’t even have
pockets to empty:
I’ve fine tuned my poverty

from want
to lack of want.
It’s slimming.

The more of me I surrender
to a disregard for preservation,
the more of me there is to love.

I love this lying about.  
I am hoping
to name all the vultures

before the lion
comes home
to rob me of that game.

this is the here
at the end of the road
from there to here
the here of here with no regrets
for the time spent there or in between 

I wash my hands
of the dirt and the dust
absorbed between there and here

there were pale children on the road
between me there and me here
there were filthy men and women
rod-hard dogs ravenning
cats as quick as bats
to put their fangs upon our necks
from hunger or pain

I do not regret how many I trampled
or pushed past to get to here
every angel is terrible
I do not regret the dogs and cats I slew
every angel is terrible

now that I am here
I open my blood-tipped wings
this is a heaven I’ve earned
here is where I choose to make
the gates of pearl

they may call me what they will
I walked the road I was meant to walk
and put my feet where they were meant to step
and now I am here
the here of my heel in the clotted earth
made to stand 
made to stand firm
made
not born
to be here

The whisky master says,
“I suck the tongue of truth
in every glass.”

The wine master says,
“This sweet burning
puts my eye on Heaven.”

The pot smoker
sits on his hands but he’s praying,
grinning at the answers.

Whatever we stone ourselves with
revives in us the kick
we last used in the womb —

fighting toward what’s out there,
though we have never seen it; still, we’re
surely getting there.